


The Bygones

by Greyven



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Indiana Jones but with elves and magic, Modern Era, Modern Thedas, Museums, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-17
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2018-10-19 23:37:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10650441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Greyven/pseuds/Greyven
Summary: There is a violent smuggling organization raiding elven ruins and Dr. Lavellan thinks it is more than just a black market scheme. She thinks they are using her research to choose their targets and the site of what could become the most important discovery of her career might be next on the list. She intends to do whatever it takes to protect her life's work and with the help of the strange elven professor that turns up at the Free Marches National Museum one afternoon she may actually succeed.





	1. Chapter 1

Dr. Lavellan didn’t appreciate Dorian telling her how many types of cancer she was going to die from so she put her cigarette out in what was left of her tea before she read the article.

  
_“Tuesday of last week brought the arrest of three members of the smuggling organization known as the Venatori when Ferelden authorities raided a location near Redcliffe that proved to be a drop zone for stolen artifacts. Among the items recovered were an ancient elvhen tapestry, a jade dragon statue, and a ceremonial blade, all confirmed to have come from excavation site 206A which was attacked and robbed last month. Dr. Vivienne de Fer of the University of Val Royeaux, who was leading the dig site’s operations, has declined comment since her initial statement immediately after she was treated for injuries she sustained during the attack.”_

“Shit.”

Lavellan wished she was reading the analog version of _Thedas Archeology_ so she could throw it across her office. She settled for shoving her computer mouse hard enough that it skittered over the edge of her desk and dangled by its chord.

  
“Dorian!” she shouted. He hated when she shouted.

He burst through the door with a scowl. “Unless you’re dying I don’t –,”

“It was them. Again.”

She turned the monitor his way and stood glaring at the map on the wall between the two windows. It was stuck in various places with tiny, sword-shaped push pins and she added another to the spot in the Arbor Wilds labeled “206A.”

“Hm. They certainly have a thing for Elvhen ruins,” Dorian mused behind her. “Do you still think there’s something more to this than a brutish black market scheme?”

Lavellan spun on him with a raised brow. “Do you still not?”

“I just-,” he passed a hand over his faced. “It’s still difficult to believe. Not that your theories are entirely implausible, Lavellen, but you know better than I do that Elvhen artifacts have always fetched the highest prices at auction. Is it so shocking that organized crime would take an interest eventually?”

Lavellan gave him a frosty look. She was sick of hearing this. When the attacks had first started he’d said, “Venatori? That’s a Tevinter name if I’ve ever heard one. Ten sovereigns says it’s nationalist zealots vandalizing what’s left of the empire they wish they were. How pathetic.”

“Seven sites in the last six months, Dorian.” She had to make him see sense. “Five of which I discussed at length in my research. How can you say that’s coincidence?”

  
Dorian glanced at the map, shifting uncomfortably. Lately it had been an exercise in mental dexterity trying to decide if he didn’t believe her or if it was just easier for him to ignore the problem all together. It was against everything in Dorian’s character to ignore problems but it was an idea that was easier to accept than the knowledge that her only friend didn’t trust her judgement.

“Two of those were completely unrelated,” he remarked gently and it stoked something icy inside her. “First the one in Nevarra and now this second one. Maybe they’re using your research as a reference for potential targets but there is no evidence of any motive besides greed and vandalism.”

Lavellan refused to admit that he was correct. The few members of the Venatori that had been caught refused to speak of their organizations operations. There was infuriatingly little information for the authorities to work with.

“Just make sure to tell Cassandra and Cullen to be careful. They’re still at risk, regardless.”

“Worry not.” Dorian reached for her hand and kissed it, his moustache tickling her knuckles. “I’ve already had some extra security sent their way. And our dear Cassandra is a dead shot with those twin pistols of hers so I’ve no doubt any Venatori would have a world of trouble getting past her.”

He adjusted the red satin cravat looped around his neck and swept from her office leaving behind the faint scent of cardamom and a shadow of unease over Lavellan’s mind.

***

She was late starting the afternoon tour.

Damn smoking habit. She’d meant to quit ages ago but so many things had gotten in the way. Now her regular nicotine fix was getting in the way of her job.

There was a sizable crowd gathered near the ancient history wing and a several people were looking quite agitated and impatient. Lavellan went down the grand staircase so quickly she ran headlong into an old woman going the opposite way.

“Apologies,” Lavellan said curtly.

The woman barely spared her a glance with her crow’s feet lined eyes but she offered a tight lipped smile.

“No please, pardon me.”

“If you’re here for the tour it will begin shortly,” Lavellan announced. She had to shout to be heard over the mid-day crowd.

She hated doing these tours. Half the people who went on them wouldn’t know a true fact if it reared up and slapped them in the face. The other half thought they knew more than she did and liked to ask clever questions to prove it. She wouldn’t have agreed to do these in the first place if Dorian hadn’t said, “I’m not going to pay you to sit in your office and poke at pieces of broken pottery all day.”

He’d been joking of course. He knew she had research to do, dissertations to review, and journal articles to write and Lavellan had the suspicion he just wanted her to learn to be nicer to people. People weren’t things she had much time for. Or much patience.

If anything the tours made her even less inclined to be friendly to anyone that didn’t have a PhD or unrestricted access to a research laboratory. This particular group was exceedingly boring. Not a single question was asked and no parents rushed away in embarrassment as they apologized for screaming children.

There was one elven man that looked like an intellectual type, all dressed in an expensive tweed jacket with elbow patches and everything. He was attentive and his expression was serious. Lavellan kept waiting for him to contradict one of her points or debate with her but he remained silent.

What a shame.

She’d memorized the tour the first time she’d done it. Now, after five years of working at the Free Marches National Museum it was a mindless task. The best part was that the route ended in what she called the Eluvian Room. It was a chamber dedicated to ancient elvhen architecture and the tours were the only time she ever visited the room during business hours. The quiet that settled after the museum closed its doors to the public was much better suited to the room’s atmosphere with its jade mosaics and sculptures that whispered of a more magical time long past.

The effect was completely ruined with the dismissed tour group chatting idly as they trickled away to other parts of the museum.

Lavellan was busy frowning at her own exhausted appearance in the replica eluvian towering in the center of the room when his reflection appeared behind hers.

He was taller than she’d thought when he was farther away and she had to lift her chin to look him in the eye. But the tweed jacket was certainly as expensive as it seemed even if it was a bit worn. It looked like an antique. How pretentious.

“You’re Dalish, are you not?”

His voice was warm with friendly curiosity and his eyes were bright.

“I’d say that’s fairly obvious, wouldn’t you?” Lavellan retorted. Dalish vallaslin were a rare sight, almost non-existent in urban areas, but everyone knew what they meant. Most just knew better than to ask questions of the poor souls who bore them.

She wasn’t expecting him to laugh but he did. It was like molten honey.

“I suppose it is,” he said, his eyes still crinkled in a smile, “but one must start a conversation somewhere. I am Solas.”

She ignored the hand he held out for her to shake and his cheerful expression faltered slightly. “Dr. Lavellan.”

He may have been comfortable with first name familiarity between strangers but she certainly wasn’t and especially not with one who blatantly pointed out her former lifestyle.

“Did you have a question about the tour?” she asked hoping to divert his attention away from her tattoos.

“I was wondering if the esteemed Free Marches National Museum has any feelings on the recent rise in smuggling.”

Something pinched in Lavellan’s heart. The stranger seemed insistent on speaking of all the most difficult topics.

“The museum itself is at no risk of attack,” she replied blandly, hoping he wouldn’t see through to her agitation. “And it’s doing everything it can to aid the authorities in their efforts against the Venatori.”

More than that she refused to say. There was the ever present worry that the Western Approach site would end up a target, and by her request Dorian had agreed to keep the excavation from the public eye until all discoveries made there were safely secured in the museum’s laboratories.

That ruin was her life, her entire career. Years of research all hinged on whatever was down there. There was no way she was going to risk it by giving it some preemptive publicity. And even if her theories were wrong…

Well.

This man, Solas, didn’t need to know any of that. Let him wait for the articles to be published and the exhibits to be opened like everyone else. Then she would answer whatever foolish questions he wanted to ask. Until then…

“I’m sorry, serah, but I really must return to my other duties,” she said.

He straightened and seemed surprised at being dismissed.

“I – yes. Of course. Thank you for your time.” He frowned as he walked away with his arms clasped behind his back. Instead of turning to study the displays like the other visitors had done after the tour he exited the hall and vanished into the crowd.

***

“Hey, Doc. You getting drinks with us tonight or what?”

Every Friday evening Dorian’s massive Qunari boyfriend, Iron Bull, filled up the doorway to Lavellan’s office to ask her some variation of the same question.

Her answer never changed.

“No.”

A new email had appeared in her inbox and she still hadn’t decided if she wanted to open it.

“Come on. It’ll be good for you. Help you loosen up that prickly personality.”

It was from solas@su.edu and it didn’t have a subject heading.

“Quit bothering my employees,” came Dorian’s muffled voice from down the hall.

SU. Sundermount University? He was much too old to be a student. A professor then. But of what?

“It’s just the Doc,” Bull called back.

A quick internet search told her two things: that their school colors were the unfortunate combination of maroon and taupe and, that Solas (no last name) taught in their magic department.,

“Then all the more reason to shut up. She’s never going to come with us,” Dorian said, closer now.

There was an email address listed, the same one currently sitting in her inbox, and a phone number. There was even a photograph portrait of him in the same tweed jacket she’d seen earlier that day, this time with the addition of what was possibly the ugliest plaid bow tie she’d ever seen.

“Who’s this?” Dorian said from behind her, leaning in to get a closer look at her computer screen.

“He was on the afternoon tour,” she muttered. “He sent me an email.”

“Professor of magical theory,” he said approvingly. “He’s handsome enough, I suppose, although his fashion sense is abysmal. That does seem like your type.”

Lavellan stared at him.

“It’s not like that.”

“No, it never is with you,” Dorian sighed and patted her shoulder. “But by all means do have fun stalking the poor fellow on the internet. Oh by the way, Blackwall has the night shift. Tell him I said hello.”

When he and Bull were gone she called the phone number. The voice that answered was female.

“Sundermount University adjunct office. This is Merril.”

Lavellan hung up.

Adjunct office. If he was an adjunct professor that most likely meant he had another job. She did her best to find out what it was but found no further information. No social media accounts, no scholarly publications under his name, nothing. So he either had a problem with maintaining a presence online or was a bit technologically illiterate. Both were things she could understand.

Sighing, she finally opened the email.

_Dr. Lavellan,_

_This is the email listed in your book so I trust it will reach you._

_I fear I came across too strongly when I introduced myself earlier this afternoon. I was insensitive about your Dalish roots and I apologize._

_In any case, I realize you were not eager to speak with me on the matter of the Venatori smuggling ring and I understand that you may be obligated by your employers to withhold certain information from visitors but I am hoping you will be willing to make an exception. You see, I have reason to believe this organization has a specific motivation for raiding Elvhen ruins and I believe your research is the key._

_I know this sounds highly suspect but if you would be willing to meet with me I can explain myself further and we may discuss the matter at length._

_My thanks,_

_Solas_

_Professor of Magical Theory_

_Sundermount University_

Lavellan’s breath had stuck in her throat somewhere in the middle of the email. Someone else had made the same connections she had and possibly knew something she didn’t. It should be suspicious. It should set alarm bells off in her head. Did he truly know as much as he claimed? And how had he come by this information? But all she felt was her hands trembling with excitement as she typed out a hasty response.

_Fine. I’m free tomorrow. When and where?_

She clicked send before she had time to come to her senses and talk herself out of it.


	2. Chapter 2

The address Solas gave her was of a small corner café called Tea Cakes which had a patio for outdoor dining. The weather was glorious with the sun high overhead and a fair wind keeping away most of its heat. Lavellan arrived a half hour ahead of when they agreed to meet and took one of the spots outside, watching the people in the park across the street walk their dogs and supervise their children. There was even a young couple enjoying a picnic beneath a tree heavy with spring blossoms.

She summoned as small flame in her palm and lit the end of a cigarette. The long draw she pulled from it tasted faintly of the Fade, cool and crisp amidst the tang of tobacco smoke, like snowfall after a house fire. It was a pleasant sensation that made it all the more difficult to kick the habit.

Solas was five minutes late.

He drove up in a handsome, pristine, vintage coupe that she would have been excited to see had it not reminded her of the sole vehicle kept and maintained by her clan since her grandfather was a young man. Ridiculous thing to remember. It was the same champagne color but the make and model were completely different.

He took the seat across from her, draping his jacket over the back of his chair.

“Good afternoon. I hope you weren’t waiting very long,” he said, adjusting his bow-tie. It was different from the picture she’d found, though it was just as plaid and just as hideous.

Lavellan shook her head. He didn’t need to know she’d arrived early to make sure he wasn’t trying to lead her into some back alley den of criminals.

“Good,” he clasped his hands atop the table and leaned forward. “Then I assume you have questions.”

Of course she had questions. That was the entire point of this blasted meeting. She blew out a frustrated cloud of smoke, trying to aim most of it away from him out of the little courtesy she had for others, but the breeze ended up pushing most of it back in his face anyway. He was terribly unsubtle about leaning back in his chair to avoid breathing it in. Shame burned deep in her chest. Fuck. She really did need to stop.

She took her sweet time snuffing the cigarette out in the ash tray before answering him.

“Yesterday at the museum. Why didn’t you say you’d read my book?”

He chuckled lightly. Lavellan glanced away.

“Would you have given me the time of day if I had?” He asked in a way that told her he already knew the answer.

And the answer was no. In fact she probably would have paid him even less attention. She would have directed him to the online FAQ page she’d set up to avoid conversations such as those and made her excuses to get away just as she always did when someone asked about her book. Between that and the smugglers she was beginning to wish she’d never written the damn thing at all.

“Fine,” she conceded. “Then tell me how you think you know why the Venatori are after the ruins I wrote about.”

He sighed and seemed to consider his words before answering.

“It’s quite simple. I am, what you might call, a Fadewalker.”

Lavellan stared at him.

“That is anything but simple,” she said. “You say you have one of the rarest magical abilities in the world and expect me to believe it without proof?”

“Proving it would be something of an invasion of privacy as I would have to find your spirit in the Fade and enter your dreams as you slept. So unless you’re willing to-,”

“No.”

“Then you shall have to take my word for it. For now at the very least, Dr. Lavellan.” He leveled her with a serious look and she struggled not to break eye contact.

She should have left then. Gotten into her tiny two-door and driven back to her apartment to spend the day with her cat. It went against everything she knew to believe something without a shred of evidence behind it.

Maybe it was something about the weather that made her stay despite how little she knew of this man and how outlandish his claims were. Maybe it was the way the scent of flowers clung to the spring air or the way the sun warmed Solas’ skin to a rosy tan. But on the chance that what he said was true she would hear him out. She owed her career to people taking chances on her, after all. So she would take a chance on him.

Never mind that she was burning with a curiosity she hadn't felt in ages.

“Very well. Then explain how this gift allows to know such things,” she said.

Solas folded his hands together solemnly. The café was becoming crowded for the lunch hour and Lavellan wondered if they should worry about being overheard. If Solas truly was a Fadewalker, a dreamer like he said, then he likely held some notability among his peers…unless he had reason to hide this from them. And given how little she’d been able to discover of him, that was very likely. Was it wise to be discussing these topics out in the open? A few people were giving Solas’ car curious glances but otherwise none paid them the slightest attention.

“Firstly, tell me what you already know of Fadewalking. I know that research into the subject is severely lacking and the information that does exist is often inaccurate,” he said.

Lavellan considered for a moment. “I know that you are able to take conscious control of your dreams and traverse them as you would the waking world.” She thought of what he said about proving his abilities. “And you can apparently contact others through their dreams?”

“That is true, but there is much more as well,” Solas explained, “I can move through dreams much as I can the real world but I also see the dreams and memories of ages long past. They linger there, often the only remaining knowledge of those who lived long ago. And I may also converse with the spirits that dwell there. Those that are willing to speak with me at least.”

“Ah. So you stumbled upon some information about the elven ruins that might indicate why the Venatori are so interested in them,” Lavellan concluded. Impressive. A talent like that would be beyond value in her field. Even if everything he said was lies, they were creative, she would give him that.

Solas watched her for a moment, pensive, and she shifted under his gaze. She noticed him picking at a spot where his shirt sleeve was fraying. Now that she looked closely she realized that all of his clothes were worn nearly threadbare. The knees of his trousers had faded long ago and his leather shoes were so badly scuffed she doubted that was their original color. But they were clearly high quality despite their aged appearance. Curious.

“Have you considered digging in the Western Approach?” he asked.

Lavellan froze.

“I see. So you are already digging there.”

She stared at him.  Should she confirm or deny? Neither option was a good one.

He held his hands up defensively. “My interest is purely academic. For the sake of keeping history out of unsavory hands.”

She crossed her arms.

“How did you know about that?”

“I didn’t. Not entirely. It was merely a hypothesis based on what you write in _The Fall of a Civilization_ and what I’ve learned in the Fade. As it happens I was right.” He drew his chair closer to the table with a scrape of cast iron on stone. Lavellan leaned in with a frown when he continued in hushed tones.

“Nearly a month ago I came across a rather ancient spirit of wonder who spoke of little else but what it called ‘a light so bright it was darkness.’ When I asked where it found such a thing it said it was in ‘the deep woods’ but couldn’t be found again since the woods had filled up with sand. It’s difficult to estimate the age of spirits since they experience time differently than you or I do, and it spoke mostly gibberish as those spirits are prone to do but-,”

“The Western Approach used to be a forest.”

“Yes.”

It was a discovery a team of geologists had made some years ago. They’d been analyzing sandstone samples in a cave when they found an unusual substance that proved to be fossilized tree matter. That moment had gotten her thinking; if an entire forest had once covered the landscape of western Orlais, what else might be there, buried deep beneath the sand for thousands of years?

Lavellans heart was hammering.

A light so bright it was darkness.

That could mean anything. And who even knew how a spirit would perceive present things let alone something it encountered thousands of years ago. But if it was what she thought it was, what she hoped it was…

“I – Thank you for telling me this,” she said still unsure how much to believe. Although his guess about the Western Approach did make his claim more likely. “I might be interested in discussing this further a different day.” They’d been at the café longer than she’d realized and they were now the only ones there.

“Of course. Let me give you my phone number,” Solas said fishing something out of his pocket. Lavellan snorted when they traded cells and she realized he’d handed her a flip phone.

“What’s the matter? The Cyber Age isn’t good enough for you?”

He scowled and snatched his phone back when she was done.

“What reason is there to have something else when this is perfectly adequate?” he asked. “I suppose you’re young enough not to remember a time when computers didn’t exist. I however, must learn to adjust.”

She raised a brow.

“That doesn’t mean I _knew_ they existed or would have had access to one even if I had,” she said, trying to keep the ice out of her tone.

Solas blinked. His frown deepened. “Forgive me. I often forget how the Dalish live.”

Lavellan wished she could forget as easily. Unfortunately the memories were literally written on her face. She stood, gathering up her own phone and her pack of cigarettes.

“Thank you for the information, but I have some work to get back to.”

She moved to walk away but he caught her wrist with cool fingers.

“I meant no offense.”

“I know.”

“I’m sorry if they mistreated you.” His eyes were wide with apology and Lavellan realized she couldn’t tell what color they were. Slate grey or deep, dusty blue. “It’s easy for me to forget myself around you.”

She stared at him. “You don’t even know me.”

“But I would like to,” he said with a small smile that made his eyes disappear.

If Lavellan had no idea what to think of him before she certainly didn’t now. She looked away from him unable to bare the intensity in his eyes. The street was busy even while the café was deserted. The park too was beginning to empty, the young couple folding away their picnic blanket after an afternoon basking in each other’s company.

She pulled her hand from his.

“You know how to contact me, Solas.”

When she returned home she realized she’d gotten two calls while she was driving. Both were from the landline in the clan’s farmhouse.

She deleted the voice messages without listening to them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter Lavellan does a lot of staring at Solas. Can't say I blame her.  
> Also it's officially finals week for me. Yay. There might not be a chapter next week because of how little time I'll have to write in the next few days but we'll see. Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think so far.


	3. Chapter 3

Lavellan’s childhood with the Dalish was peaceful for the most part. Some might even call it idyllic. The clan’s farm rested in an isolated valley to the west of Wycome, far from the noise polution of major highways. The horizon was lined with purple mountain peaks that caught the rising and setting of the sun like worshippers reaching out to touch their gods.

They were mostly self-sufficient, growing their own food in the sprawling fields behind the massive farmhouse they all shared, and only purchased anything new when they couldn’t make it themselves. Lavellan spent her earliest years darting around in the tall grass with her many cousins or fighting for a turn with the bicycle while the adults tended the crops and halla or did repair work on the few machines they owned.

Those days were filled with innocence, tangled hair full of leaves, and bare feet covered in dirt. Instead of going to school the children were taught by older clan members. Lavellan had fond memories of her mother teaching her simple arithmetic with wild chestnuts as they picked them from a tree on the edge of the small patch of forest on the farthest parts of the clan’s property.

Lavellan’s father was one of few mages among them. When she was five and began showing signs of magical abilities he was excused from several of this other duties to dedicate his time toward training her.

“Close your eyes. Breath, deep in your lungs. Can you feel the Fade behind the Veil? The tingle in your fingers?” he said as he held her tiny hands in his rough, calloused ones. “You are more connected to the world than other people. It speaks to you, and if you listen properly there will be nothing you can’t do with its gift at your side.”

Those were what she remembered as the good years, when there was always a cousin her age to go make trouble with, newborn halla to feed, fences to build, and cold honey tea to drink.

They didn’t last.

There was a long dirt road that wound away from the farmhouse’s drive way like the tail end of a yarn ball that had rolled out of reach. It was lined with oak trees so large their roots made awkward lumps in the otherwise smooth path. In the summer, when the leaves were thick, the branches formed a sort of roof and the road became a tunnel.The children were forbidden to walk any length of it without the company of an adult and even the adults were encouraged to avoid it unless they were taking the car to run errands.

“What’s at the end of the road in the front of the house?” she asked her father one day after a lesson on creation magic.

“A mailbox.”

They’d been practicing accelerating plant growth and both had green leaf matter staining their fingers and jammed under their nails. He picked at his thumb and didn’t look at her.

“I know that.” They were in the forest and Lavellan struggled to keep up with him through the thick undergrowth. “But what’s past that? Where do you go when you take the car on the weekend?” She was ten at the time and the question had been bumping around in her head for weeks. How had she never thought to wonder before?

He grabbed her wrist, swinging her up and over a fallen log in their path. “There’s a small town. It’s where we buy gasoline for the tractor and sell some of the wood carvings your mother and Aunt Gilena make.”

Her mind may have short circuited with questions then. What was town? Do other clans live there? Can I go to town?

When the farmhouse was in sight he stopped, gripping her shoulders and forcing her to look him in the eye. “The people there aren’t like us. When you’re older and have your vallaslin I’ll take you with me and you’ll understand,” he said, rustling her hair. “Until then you shouldn’t worry yourself over it. Don’t think about it.” His tone and the serious look in his eye made whatever questions she had left died on her tongue.

How could she not think about it? Just as she’d never considered what might be past the mailbox she’d never dreamed there were other people beyond the clan’s borders. Suddenly she felt unbearably tiny.

The knowledge of “town” should have excited her. It did to some extent. The world was infinitely bigger than she’d ever thought before and the possibilities were endless but also terrifying. Why were so few clan members permitted to travel beyond the sanctuary of the farm? Perhaps these other people were dangerous. But if that were true then surely her father would not interact with them with nothing but magic to protect him.

“How are the town people different from us?” she asked her mother while they sorted laundry. Her mother stopped inspecting a tattered pair of denim shorts to stare at her.

“Where did you hear that, sweetie?”

“I asked daddy what was past the mailbox.”

Her mother hummed instead of answering. Then after a moment she rose and left the room. Lavellan blinked after her, confused. Her mother never came back to help with the laundry and she was forced to finish the rest herself.

Later when the children were harvesting tomatoes under a blistering sun her father pulled her aside. His lips were pressed thin and his shoulders were tense. She could see her mother and Keeper Deshanna watching them from the back porch.

Her father took her hand in his. “I know you’re very eager to get to know the world but your mother and I need to to stop asking questions about the town. Focus on your studies. For me, alright?”

Lavellan didn’t understand but she promised regardless and for a while she managed to put the matter out of her mind entirely.

Time passed strangely for children and she wasn’t sure how much time passed between that conversation with her father and the day she found herself pulling weeds from the front flower beds. She looked up and found herself alone, no other children in sight. Unfortunately children often don’t possess the proper foresight to make rational decisions.

Surely it wouldn’t hurt. She’d be back before anyone could notice her absence.

She made her way down the path away from the house.

That day Keeper Deshanna beat her in front of the other children. They made a point to avoid her company after that.

“You always were so inquisitive,” her mother sighed, stroking her hair while she wept. “You know that saying about the cat.” But Lavellan didn’t care if curiosity would kill her. She made plans to run.

It took several years to find the opportunity. She was watched constantly, rarely allowed any privacy and was forbidden from straying near the front side of the house without company. Her vallaslin was fresh on her face when she cast a sleeping spell over the other girls who shared her room, climbed out the window, and shinnied down the gutter to land in the hedge outside.

She held her breath, praying no one had woken from the sound, until she was certain she heard nothing but the creaking of crickets. There was a light still on in Deshanna’s room and Lavellan could see her pacing back and forth in front of the desk lamp. The moon was a sharp sliver but Lavellan still brought a hand up to shield her eyes in case someone peered out into the night. Elf night vision was a doubled-edged sword. She could navigate the dark gardens with ease but the reflection in her eyes was sure to betray her location if someone looked her way at the wrong moment.

The tree tunnel was eerie at night, the rustle of leaves whispering overhead. She walked for what felt like an age with nothing but her own breathing to keep her company until the trees ended and she found herself beside a tiny metal box sat atop a splintery wooden post leaning precariously to one side. The hinges screeched, harsh and bloody when she opened it and her fingers ended up stained with rust. She left it hanging open, gaping and empty.

There was a glimmer of electric lighting a few miles down the road and she moved toward it with trembling hands.

That night she stole a bicycle in front of a convenience store. She burned through the chain with a concentrated summoned flame and rolled it away with her shoulders set as if she were meant to be doing it. She dragged it all the way to the deepest part of the forest on clan Lavellan’s property and magically grew a tangle of brambles to hide it. It would be her salvation in the coming years.

Sometimes she still couldn’t believe she ended up where she was today, far from that valley near Wycome. Like maybe her flat would melt into nonexistence as she woke up to find herself back in the bunk beds she shared with two other girls on the farm. She felt surreal, as if her hands weren’t her own or that her mind was lagging a few moments behind her body, lingering in the past while the rest of her drifted along in the present. It was a heavy thing to think about when she was doing something as mundane as cooking breakfast on a Sunday morning.

Even in the middle of the bustling city her flat had a quiet privacy to it that she’d never had for most of her life even after renouncing her Dalish heritage. But she prefered the solitude. One thing she learned very quickly was that she had an incredible tolerance for clutter when no one was around to police her tidiness. Living alone meant there was no one else to share the chores with and she was more than alright with that. Maybe there were dishes spilling out of the sink and maybe there was a mountain of laundry waiting to be folded in the other room but at least it was all hers and hers alone. An infinitely better alternative to the time when she’d never owned anything for herself and everything she touched belonged to everyone else as well.

Her phone rang. Her hand stalled flipping pancakes onto a plate.

It had been several days since she’d met with Solas. He’d made a few clumsy attempts to text her before they decided to rely on emails. Conversation topics had remained professional, mostly about work, but he had yet to call her.

It wasn’t him.

It was the number of the satellite phone Cullen and Cassandra used whenever they were at remote dig sites.

“Hello?” She tucked the phone between her ear and shoulder.

“Dr. Lavellan. Thank goodness you picked up. It has been hell trying to get calls to go through.” Cassandra’s voice rang through a bit grainy and metallic but was otherwise clear.

“Is everything alright?” she asked. They normally only called her about major developments, leaving the regular updates and administration issues in Dorian’s hands.

“We are very close to uncovering the entrance to the ruin.”

Lavellan’s heart leapt in her throat and she had to put down the syrup she was about to pour on her pancakes.

“That’s fantastic. Dorian and I will have to fly out.”

“Yes. Preferably within the next few weeks. Dorian thinks it would be best for you to be here beforehand to take an active role in the excavation…” Cassandra trailed off and someone mumbled tersely in the background.

“I’m sure that will not deter her...It has not been so far...We won’t know for sure until she and Dorian are here.”

“Cassandra, I don’t like being confused. What’s going on?” she said.

“I’m sorry.” Cassandra sighed roughly. “There have been disturbances. Magical disturbances from whatever is down there. Cullen has been concerned, as has most of the rest of the crew, but nothing dangerous has happened.”

Lavellan abandoned her breakfast, appetite vanishing along with her patience.

“Why didn’t I hear about this sooner?” It only served as further evidence that she was right. Either the ruin had once contained something so powerful that it’s magical signature still registered thousands of years later, or that thing was still there.

“Initially we ignored it. The weather behaves erratically here and we thought it had to do with the sandstorms,” Cassandra explained. “It began with objects moving small distances but that was easily blamed on the wind. Then one of the security men walked off to relieve himself while we were digging. He returned raving and crying, swearing he’d been wandering the desert lost for days although it had barely been two minutes. The medic blamed the episode on dehydration and sun exposure but the poor man was so distraught we sent him home.”

“Then as we got closer to the entrance we began noticing unusually high numbers of dead animals in the area, foul odors with no apparent source, and now none of us can stand to dig for more than an hour without becoming physically ill. The mages here do not know what to make of it. We were hoping you and Dorian will have more insight.”

“It may be a defensive ward. To make the area repulsive to would be intruders,” Lavellan mused. She was itching to return to the Western Approach. The next few weeks would be excruciating. “More than that I can’t say without being there...but I may know someone who can help.”

“Wonderful. We will keep in touch. Cullen says hello.”

“Stay safe, Cassandra.”

“I am always safe,” Cassandra scoffed and then clicked off the line. Then Lavellan turned on her computer to write an email to a certain magic theory professor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not very happy with this chapter but I figured a shitty chapter was better than no chapter at all. Is anyone even reading this?


	4. Chapter 4

Dorian was fiddling with some extravagantly expensive machine he’d bought for his office. It resembled a small space capsule but he claimed it made cappuccinos although he had yet to convince it to produce a single cappuccino.

“My family called," she said, “Twice.”

“Did you answer?”

“No.”

“Did they leave messages?”

“Yes.”

“Did you listen to them?”

“No, I deleted them.”

“Ah. The modern equivalent of burning an unread letter. How delicious.”

Lavellan rolled her eyes and the coffee machine made a worrying whistling noise like a tea kettle left on a burner too long.

“Yeah? And how are Mr. and Mrs. Pavus doing these days?”

Dorian laughed shortly. “I haven’t the slightest. I think they’re hoping giving me the cold shoulder will make me go running back to them like a kicked puppy. As if I haven’t been doing the same thing to them for years and been perfectly content.” He ripped the machine’s plug from the wall and the noise reduced to a weak hiss before dying out. “That or they are pretending I don’t exist. Felix tells me they’ve stopped asking him about me.”

"And how is Felix?" she asked, hesitantly.

"Feeling better, actually!"

Lavellan relaxed, leaning against the desk to watch him work.

Perhaps Solas had experienced some estrangement from his own family. That might explain the expensive car, the state of his fine clothing, even the fossil he called a cell phone. He’d clearly once had money, family money perhaps, and now that he no longer had access to it he was forced to maintain what he already had instead of buying anything new.

Or maybe he just preferred to wear his grandfather’s hand-me-downs.

Solas had given her quite a lot of information regarding the magical field surrounding the ruin. His initial email had been short.

_Dr. Lavellan,_

_I’m reasonably certain that is a perceptive reality barrier although I have never encountered one of such strength. As for the dead animals, they were likely driven mad by it and died of natural causes when their survival instincts failed. Your colleagues should be fine however._

_S_

Then he’d sent her two attachments, a couple of scholarly articles going into more detail on the subject. One was about perceptive reality barriers themselves and their effects on the mental functions of living creatures. It appeared to be exactly what Lavellan said it was; a defensive measure to keep out unwanted guests without the need for physical force. At its weakest level the barrier caused feelings of unease and at its strongest it could prompt hallucinations and potentially life threatening psychotic episodes. It worked by interfering with the brain’s neural chemistry and therefore was more effective on simple minded creatures. That explained how it killed the animals but left Cullen and Cassandra with little more than nausea and vomiting.

The second article was a study on the intensity of magical frequencies as a function of time and material obstacle. Most of it was information Lavellan already knew through experience - spells waned over time and certain ones couldn’t travel through objects very well. But the study did present a finding that surprised her.

Solid objects should sometimes block a spell entirely, but loose objects, such as grains of sand, were free to vibrate in alternating harmonies with the Veil. A spell traveling through such a medium would behave erratically when its field scattered, having unpredictable effects that were sometimes in direct opposition to the intent of the caster.

This meant that Cullen and Cassandra had no hope of guessing the nature of what they might be facing down there. The barrier would only get stronger with each layer of sand removed and they had very little means of combatting it until Lavellan and Dorian arrived.

She tried to relay all of this to Cassandra but the particulars of it were mostly lost on her. When she’d told Dorian he’d accepted it with his typical complaining but did immediately being their travel plans. Everyone involved agreed their arrival was better scheduled for sooner rather than later.

One week and they’d be in Orlais.

“Ah. There we are,” Dorian said. The machine started spitting coffee into a white porcelain mug. “Want some?”

Lavellan sneered and left the office.

It was opening day of the Inquisition exhibit they’d gotten on loan from the Frostback Archeology Institute and the museum was disgustingly crowded. She’d been alternating hiding in Dorian’s office and her own to avoid being voluntold into helping out with the traffic. Leliana was the authority on the subject and she was pleasant enough but her heavy Orlesian accent and flowery language grated Lavellan’s already thin patience.

The museum had dedicated an entire section of the gift shop to sell Inquisition themed merchandise. There were Ameridan plush dolls, replicas of his weapons, and little models of Hakon.

If ever there was a historical hero it was Ameridan. Anyone who had the balls to magically bind himself to a godly dragon for hundreds of years and ultimately sacrifice himself for the survival of the world was guaranteed a spot amongst legends.

He was even more popular than the heroes of the Blights.

Lavellan always attributed that to the fact that the Grey Warden order was still functional while Ameridan’s Inquisition had died with him. If her area of expertise had taught her anything it was that living entities were much less mysterious than those long deceased. It always felt like there was more to be learned from something that no longer existed.

Two children screamed as they fought with toy staves. She looked toward the sound and caught sight of a very bald elf in a tweed jacket browsing shelves. Lavellan squeezed past an obnoxious hoard of tourists to stand behind him.

“A fan of Telana?” she asked. Solas turned to see her and put down the small figurine of Ameridan’s lover he’d been admiring.

He smirked. “She was a dreamer. It’s narcissistic, I suppose, but it’s difficult not to compare her to myself.”

“I’ve always found the whole tale a bit too conveniently tragic,” she said without thinking. Solas moved to leave the noisy gift shop and she followed. They merged seamlessly into the flow of hallway traffic.

Solas glanced at her with a raised brow. “Why is that?”

“He planned to unite Orlais and the Dales against the Blight but disappeared before he could make good on it. And all the talk of racial harmony and cooperation? At the risk of being presentist, I’d say he was very ahead of his time..” Solas was staring at her with an unreadable expression. She glanced at him and away, unable to gather her thoughts and maintain eye-contact at the same time. She took a breath and watched the marble floor go past beneath her feet. “My point is, he was the idealist hero taken when the world needed him most. Add in the detail about his lover dying in vain, waiting for his return and it’s no wonder at all that there are so many plays and films about his life.”

They were close to the dragonology department now and Lavellan could see the edge of the dragon skeleton’s monstrous skull glaring down at them from the ceiling. She turned away from it.

“Would you not do the same in his position?” Solas asked, glancing upward when they entered the exhibit. The skeleton was suspended over the entire room and commanded the attention of everyone who came through the arched doorway, blanketing all beneath the span of its wings.

“Who knows?” she answered, leaning against a carved support column that was mostly out of the way. She’d always assumed she would make a terrible leader and had never wanted the opportunity. In professional environments she tended to speak exclusively in words with more than three syllables, and in casual conversation she did her best to use only the words “yes” and “no.” But talking with Solas seemed easy now that they’d had more than one encounter with each other, most likely because they had similar academic interests. In fact, she quite speaking to him. Not that it was something she would ever admit.

“Dorian says I’m too closed-off and cynical to trust a puppy so I’d be pretty useless in diplomatic negotiations.”

Solas said nothing. His gaze was tracking something past Lavellan’s shoulder and he’d gone slightly pale.

“Who are you-?” He caught her shoulders when she turned to look. She froze.

“Don’t. Don’t look.” He grabbed her arm and nearly dragged her through the halls. Lavellan was so shocked at his sudden change in behavior that she didn’t think to pull away from his grasp. They took random turns into random exhibits. They were in ancient history, then contemporary, then in the back near the stairs where there was barely anyone around. Solas moved quickly but smoothly with single-mindedness and said nothing in response to the inarticulate sputterings Lavellan was producing. His hand on her arm was sweating. Clearly he was worried if not outright panicked.

“What the hell is going on?” she managed a few times.

“I’m sorry,” was all he said.

He pulled her into an alcove and Lavellan was suddenly, horrifyingly aware of the few inches of space left between them.

“What. The. Fuck.” She hissed and finally tried to wrench her arm from the vice grip he had on her. He smelled of pine and honey and resin and the scent was dragging back memories of forests behind farmhouses and she desperately needed to put three more feet between them if not three more miles.

“I’m sorry,” he said again. He leaned to peer into the hall and released her. She stepped away from him immediately and almost tripped when her high heels tangled together.

Solas put out a hand to steady her. They were completely alone in the hall.

She gave him a hard stare until his fingers left her elbow.

“I have to go,” he said quickly, not meeting her eyes.

“Seriously? You’re not going to explain whatever ghost you just saw?”

“I promise I will. But not now.” He was already walking away.

Lavellan stood dumbfounded, watching his back until he disappeared around the corner.

***

She couldn’t push the event from her mind for the rest of the day. Here she thought she might have been on her way toward making what resembled a real friendship instead of another annoying, petty acquaintance, and Solas had gone and done something strange and unexpected even by her standards. Not that any of their previous interaction had been normal but this time was different. This time there was an element of fear and it put her on edge. What was she meant to think of this man who kept appearing suddenly and turning everything in her life on its head? How was she supposed to react to someone who insisted on casual physical contact even when the two of them barely knew each other?

_You don’t even know me._

_But I would like to._

Lavellan didn’t know what to think of anything at the moment.

Traffic through the ancient history exhibit was sparse and she meandered through it answering pointless questions (Where’s the bathroom? Can I take a picture of this?) just to distract herself with something nearly as bothersome as Solas’s troubling behavior.

But eventually she could procrastinate no longer.

She let herself into the lab, a windowless room largely made of stainless steel, and set about photographing and taking notes on what remained of a wooden plank that seemed to be from an ancient Tevinter ship. The carvings indicated this was true but it would need to be carbon dated to determine approximate age and chemical tested to confirm it had indeed been found near the northern border of the Free Marches as the donor claimed.

That wasn’t her job though. All she had to do was handle the artifact without breaking it into a million pieces and remove a sample in a way that the damage wouldn’t be obvious. Eventually it would be put on display and it needed to look like it hadn’t been dissected on a lab table.

The plank was old, a few thousand years at least. It was amazing something made of organic material had withstood that amount of time. Most likely it had been reinforced with structural barriers but Lavellan couldn’t feel any so she couldn’t know for certain until she ran it under a Residual Magical Field meter. Even so it was nearly falling apart anyway. She had to wear gloves, a mask, and a shower cap just to keep from breathing on it or getting oil from her skin all over it. She was even wearing a frock specifically designed to keep dust particles from floating off her clothes and getting wedged into microscopic cracks and crevices in ancient wooden planks.

Taking a scalpel and the world’s tiniest forceps, she coaxed a splinter from one of the broken off edges and dropped it in a plastic bag.

Her phone rang in her pocket.

She told her lab assistant, Cole, to put the plank back in storage before she walked out. Cole could be a bit...spacey, and Dorian had been hesitant to hire him but Cole handled the artifacts with even more care than Lavellan did.

“Hello?” she said. She wedged her phone between her shoulder and ear and stripped off her gloves and frock.

“Dr. Lavellan.”

“Solas.” She paused. The choice between politeness and annoyance was difficult. “Are you alright?”

“Yes.” The exhaustion in his voice was palpable. “And I suppose I need to explain myself.”

“That would be nice.”

“I...saw someone I’m on quite poor terms with,” he said slowly. “I shouldn’t have brought you into it but my thoughts in other places at the moment.”

“I see. That’s understandable.” Lavellan though back to her conversation with Dorian that morning. Perhaps he’d seen a family member, or a friend associated with them. The idea made her sad as she made her way down the hall to her office.

“It’s unfortunate you’re able to say that with a great deal of truth.”

She gritted her teeth and hoped she would go the rest of the day without having her family mentioned. “Perhaps we should talk about something more comfortable for both of us.”

“I agree.” There was a low white noise in the background that sounded like he was driving. “Allow me to make it up to you. Come to dinner with me and we can ignore our respective bad relationships together.”

Lavellan drew in a sharp breath and shoved a hand through her hair, now disheveled from the long day at work. She stared at her desk with its slumping piles of book and paper and the tea cups she really should have brought home yesterday. Everything was a bit of a mess. Her heart was much quicker than it had any right to be. Logic told her to say no, let him down gently before he got invested in whatever he thought this was going to be and inevitably backed out. Her heart ached remembering the way he smelled and told her it would hurt being near someone who reminded her too much of other things.

But maybe she wanted some new memories to go along with the past.

“Fine. But no plaid.”

Solas laughed, infectious and unexpected. “I can’t promise anything.”


	5. Chapter 5

Lavellan had a _time_ figuring out what to wear.

Despite repeated text messages (which he refused to answer) and several emails asking where he was taking her, Solas would only say, “It’s a surprise.”

Finally, when she was standing in her underwear amid a pile of discarded outfits, she resorted to calling him. He picked up on the first ring.

“But what do I wear, Solas?” she barked, startling the cat out from under her bed.

He chuckled. “Something nice, presumably.”

“That doesn’t help.”

It also didn’t help that at twenty-four years old she’d never been on a date. She’d had numerous offers, of course, mostly from fellow scholars who came to visit the museum and then claimed to have become enamored with her charm and with and other useless qualities she was very aware she lacked completely. Lavellan normally turned them down with lethal levels of disdain. Dorian found it all incredibly hilarious.

Once, just after she’d begun working at the museum, and before she’d even known his name, Blackwall had bought her flowers and tickets to a performance of The Champion of Kirkwall. Shocked and unable to form words, she’d gaped at him until he dropped the bouquet on her desk and fled. Lavellan felt guilty about it until the flowers died weeks later, unmoved from where he’d left them.

It worked out well enough, though. Blackwall had given the opera tickets to one of the girls who handled the museum’s public image and Lavellan had heard they’d recently gotten engaged.

Solas seemed confident enough if he was trying to surprise her. His voice suggested calm experience, with an implied smirk and a wink, when he told her to “wear something nice”. Lavellan hoped she could comfortably take his lead and if she didn’t like where the evening took them she would simply demand he take her home.

Finally, Lavellan decided on a short, black dress with long sleeves and a scoop neck that showed off her collar bones. It was elegant enough that it wouldn’t look out of place in a fancy restaurant but simple enough that it would blend in if they ended up somewhere more casual. By the time slipped on the grey Oxford heels she wore to work everyday, she was feeling decently dressed.

Then her nerves kicked in. Her chest tightened as she stood in front of her bathroom mirror staring critically at the unopened eyeshadow pallette Dorian had given her last Satinalia despite her objections that she didn’t know what to do with it. She decided to forgo it and settled dabbing on a minimal amount of mascara and wishing she could afford foundation opaque enough to hide facial tattoos. As for her hair, it rarely did what she meant for it to do. Styling it involved rubbing her fingers through it hoping to achieve something messy yet unintentionally good looking. She was never sure if it worked or just made her look exactly like what she was: someone who grew up without seeing a hairbrush for weeks at a time.

What was she doing? Flitting about like a nervous teenager, that was what. She should should have said no. If things went well and he wanted a second date - Shit. If things went so well she wanted a second date…

Eventually she would have to show him her apartment. Not even Dorian had seen her apartment. The mess could be taken care of: Dishes could be washed and put away, laundry could be folded or hidden in a closet.

But there was one real problem.

Lavellan did her best to keep the smell of cigarettes at bay. She only smoked on the balcony and went through several cans of air freshener a month. She even tried warding the balcony door to keep the wind from blowing residual smoke into her tiny living room. None of it worked. It didn’t matter what she did, the stench of tobacco and nicotine seeped into everything she touched.

She already knew she would have to interrupt their evening several times to smoke, so why go at all? She had a few minutes until he arrived, she could call and say she’d gotten ill..

The door buzzer went off and she flinched.

She ran over to punch the button by the door. “Solas?”

“Yes.” His voice was unmistakable even through the shitty speaker.

Lavellan swallowed. “I’ll be right down.”

She used the time in the elevator to control her breathing.

Her lack of dating experience did nothing to change the fact that she was a grown woman, in her mid-twenties, who had no business breaking down over a simple dinner date. She should be ashamed, really. Rarely did she get well and truly nervous talking to people.

Solas, who she barely knew and had very little reason to trust, seemed to be the exception to that. She couldn’t get her knees to stop twitching.

The elevator dinged open and there he was, waiting beside his car outside the glass entryway to her building. The sun was low, just beginning to set and he was backlit in gold. When she pushed the door open to stand beside him she was enveloped in a warm pocket of honey scented air.

“Hello,” Solas said, and when he smiled it was as lovely as the evening weather. His eyes swept up from her shoes to linger on the neckline of her dress before meeting her gaze with some unreadable emotion hiding beneath his expression. Something foreign bubbled and fizzed just beneath Lavellan’s heart. She smiled coyly back at him.

I have abandoned all logic and reason, she concluded, accepting her fate with a “Thank you” as he opened the passenger side door of his car.

Unlike Lavellan’s own car, which was littered with receipts, empty water bottles, and several jackets she’d been meaning to wash for weeks, Solas’s coupe was pristine. There wasn’t a single speck of dust on the dashboard, and the decorative wooden inlays that ran along every edge were polished to a mirror-like shine. The air freshener dangling from the rear-view mirror gave the whole cabin an aroma of aged leather.

Lavellan had never seen a more beautiful vehicle.

She didn’t even want to think about what her own car smelled like.

Solas handled the manual transmission with deftness and a posture that spoke of long-term familiarity. It dredged up a painful memory of Lavellan’s father teaching her to drive the clan’s ugly battered pick-up truck. She shoved it away, though. They were meant to be ignoring that sort of thing.

Instead she watched Solas while he drove and smoothed her skirt down over her thighs. He looked great. He was wearing a smooth, black collared shirt that was in much better condition than the others she’d seen him wear and -

“I said, no plaid.”

He smirked devilishly, as if he’d been waiting for her to say something. “It’s houndstooth.”

The bowtie was black and grey, and the little interlocking polygons that made up the pattern looked nothing like teeth. It did look a lot like plaid, however. At least, it did from any distance over two meters.

Lavellan squinted. He glanced at her, clearly suppressing laughter.

“You did this on purpose,” she decided.

“I would do no such thing,” he said. He grinned and his teeth flashed white. Lavellan pretended to watch the glittering skyscrapers going past outside.

***

Solas took her to the sprawling art museum that was two blocks down from the History Museum.

Lavellan snorted. “I can’t ever get away from museums can I?”

“I thought it would be refreshing if you had the opportunity to be the casual observer for once,” he said casually.

And it was refreshing. The museum resembled hers from the outside, with the stereotypical white marble columns and statuary, but the atmosphere inside was foreign. There was a distinct lack of children under the age of sixteen and the exhibits weren’t jam packed full of display cases, since most of the items of interest lined the walls. Most of the rooms had echoing acoustics ad the whole museum had a hushed quality that reminded Lavellan of the rare couple of times she’d been in a chantry. Some of the exhibits were nearly vacant. Solas and Lavellan were often the only two guests in a room.

The quiet seemed to make Solas feel the need to whisper. He leaned in close to speak softly in her ear about art movements and techniques and the history of some of the more famous pieces. His chest brushed lightly against her shoulder each time.

Since his episode the last time they’d met, he seemed to have picked up on her discomfort at being touched, but she found she didn’t mind the proximity so much when she had room to take an easy step away.

Lavellan’s knowledge of art didn’t extend past knowing which ancient cultures used which techniques in their architecture. Ignorance or no, she found herself drawn to massive landscapes, Renaissance paintings with high contrast of light and shadow, and sculptures that mimicked life despite being stone. There was one statue of a woman clothed in a thin robe, carved in such a way that the fabric appeared sheer and insubstantial over the gentle curves of her hips. Lavellan could even see the tiny creases in the joints of her fingers and the thin lines on her palms.

Levellan had seen many marvels of both magic and nature over the course of her career. She’d seen ancient treasures preserved for thousands of years, massive architectural structures held up entirely by spellwork, and places where the Veil was so thin the Fade was nearly one with the physical world. But the fact that someone could recreate all the delicate bends and valleys of a woman’s leg with nothing but simple tools and time...that was equally amazing. It made the pieces in the modern art crude and lifeless in comparison.

She stood staring at an unframed canvas. It had one large circle of red in the upper right corner and wide brush strokes of yellow and black in the center. That was all. The placard beside it read, Serendipity.

Lavellan leaned over to Solas. “I don’t understand.”

Solas studied it, amused. “I believe it’s one of those things that emphasizes individual interpretation rather than overall presentation.” He gestured at the lines in the center. “This could represent a path traveled. And this,” he pointed at the red circle. “Could be something unexpected found along the way. An interesting message, don’t you think?”

Lavellan attempted some interpreting of her own and came to the conclusion that a child could have made it. “For a twelve year old.”

Solas didn’t respond. When Lavellan glanced at him he was staring at her with the tiniest of smiles on his lips. There was something strange and unfathomable in his eyes.

“Come with me.”

He took her hand and led her through the museum but it was nothing like his manic flight of last time. His steps were purposeful and sure and he was obviously looking for something rather than fleeing from someone.

And this time his hand was warm and gentle around hers.

Her cheeks warmed when her laced their fingers together, but she didn’t mind so much this time.

He slowed when he found it and Lavellan smiled, wide and genuine. The room was covered in massive murals. She was familiar with the ancient elven art style but she couldn’t remember ever seeing anything but prints in person. The paintings were floor to ceiling, at least three times her height in massive gilded frames. The colors were bright and lurid and organized in twisting geometric patterns that drew the eye to the center of each painting. She knew none were originals but they were still breathtaking.

“I see these often, while walking in the Fade,” Solas told her with his voice low and laced with reverence. “This style was favored by the lower classes in Arlathan, as you probably know. The rulers had delicate sculptures and life-like portraits but these…” He gestured at the room with his hand splayed, as if to cast a spell or direct her eyes to a vast landscape. “They are relatively simple, but bold and pleasing to the eye, nonetheless. The people painted what they loved and created things for the simple joy of doing so.”

Lavellan didn’t know what to say.

She approached a scene depicting a rolling field of green with dozens of stylized halla leaping over it. Above them, formed in painted cloud, is an elven woman with a round face and smiling eyes. Ghilan’nain based on the subject matter. Most of the works appeared to focus on one deity or another. Dirthamen lurked in the shadows of a moon lit forest. Mythal stood, stoic and wise, over a mass of dancing people.

Solas stepped up behind her. “Things do not need to be complicated to be beautiful.” His voice ghosted over the point of her ear and tickled the skin of her neck, just behind the corner of her jaw.

Lavellan shivered, not knowing if she agreed.

***

They left the art museum just as the sun began to set. Everything was washed in golden light and the skyscrapers glittered like crystals in the distance as Solas drove between the downtown shops and restaurants.

Solas executes a graceful parallel park in front of the very same cafe they’d met at before.

“A museum and the exact same cafe we’ve already been to,” Lavellan grumbled, climbing out of the car and onto the sidewalk. “A surprise, my ass.”

Solas laughs heartily at her. “Are you not surprised?”

Lavellan pressed her lips together and didn’t say anything.

The cafe had transformed with the evening. Lavellan’s first impression had been that it was a standard fare coffee house where hipsters went to work on their novels and thirty year old mothers went to blog about their latest juice cleanses.

Obviously she hadn’t been paying attention.

The light from the windows was saturated and glowing but the patio was muted in the twilight. There was a live band playing something smooth, like jazz but with a pop of something hard and modern underneath. The air smelled of honeysuckle and garlic sauce.

Solas led her to the table they’d shared before.

“We were too preoccupied to order anything last time,” he said. “Which is a shame. The creme brulee is delicious.”

And it was.

Solas insisted on ordering dessert first. He claimed it was because the wine he prefered went better with sweet flavors, but Lavellan still found it oddly child-like for his eccentric demeanor.

He told her about the painting he was working on: a portrait of the chantry across the street from his apartment. Lavellan told him about her cat, Varric, which she’d named after her publishing agent after losing a bet.

“I didn’t expect anyone to want to publish my work at all. My material doesn’t exactly align with commonly believed theories, but Varric never lost faith in me. He wasn’t even surprised when I hit the best-seller list,” Lavellan explained as their entrees were brought out and their creme brulee dishes were cleared away.

“You’re critical of yourself,” Solas observed solemnly while folding his napkin into his lap.

Lavellan scoffs around a bite of pasta. “Who isn’t? I hold myself to high standards so I can do the best work I’m capable of. I prefer to be honest about it instead of wallowing in self-pity.”

Solas puts his fork down and fold his arms on the table. “If only more people were so inclined, more of the world’s problems might be solved.”

“Or more might be created.”

“Perhaps.” He tips the stem of his wine glass and stares into its depths.

Lavellan doesn’t know what to say but feels the desperate need to direct the conversation away from herself. She replays his words in her head. The statements were so far removed from shallow compliments on her appearance, which were useless, or her accomplishments, which were obvious, that she was caught off guard. The direct praise of her character was strangely intimate and she blushed.

Annoyance bubbled up in her. She had thought of herself as fairly immune to compliments.

“So, you’re a part time professor. Is painting your other job?”

Solas glanced up at her, brow raised and she realized her mistake.

She winced. “I, uh… may have looked up your page on the Sundermount University website.”

Solas’ brow crawled even farther up his forehead but amusement glittered in his eyes. He pressed a finger to his lips, holding back a smile.

Lavellan picked at one of her nails. “...and I also called the number to the adjunct office.”

Solas laughed fully now. “Is that so?”

Lavellan leaned back and crossed her arms. “Don’t laugh. I have good reason to be suspicious of strangers claiming the things you did. You know just as well as I do how dangerous things are for archaeologists at the moment.”

Solas nodded seriously. “Of course. You haven’t been personally threatened, I hope.”

“No. But several of my colleagues have.” She took a long sip of wine. “One was working at the site of the most recent attack.”

“Madame de Fer,” Solas said.

“You read the articles.”

“And watched the evening news. I did as much research as I could before contacting you.”

“I see.”

Neither of them said much after that and Solas paid the bill, offering apologies for killing the mood, but Lavellan finds she doesn’t mind. She genuinely enjoyed spending time with him, even when the conversation turned serious and she’d embarrassed herself by admitting to a bit of stalking. Solas had a way of drawing feelings from her that she hadn’t felt in years, if she’d ever felt them at all.

He didn’t kiss her when he dropped her off. He didn’t even touch her hand like he’d before. She was grateful, because she wasn’t sure where the boundaries between them were at that point.

“Thank you,” she said. “I had a lovely evening.”

“It was my pleasure,” Solas said. “Will you let me take you out again next week?”

“I can’t. I’ll be in Orlais. But after…”

“Of course.” His smile reached his eyes but Lavellan heard disappointment in his voice. “I’ll see you then.”

The exchange was so quick that Lavellan was surprised when she found herself in her dark apartment. The cat jumped off the sofa when she turned on the light and wrapped himself around her ankles, crying for food.

As she sprinkled kibble into his bowl, she realized she hadn’t had a single cigarette all evening.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a re-upload from my original fic which I wasn't happy with. I re-characterized Lavellan to give her more room for character development and changed some of the story's components. Leave a comment telling me what you think. Seriously. Comments mean more to me than kudos. Thanks for reading! Look for updates on Sundays.


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